October 29/07 9:27 am - London Six Day (Day 6)

So you think you know bike racing! To the casual observer a bike race is a bike race..... wrong! A bike race is where teams of riders continually pound one another into submission and enjoy doing it.

The spectators at the Forest City Velodrome saw just that on Sunday afternoon in London, Ontario. When you can see the action happen in front of you, you get to feel the pain of the riders while they blow-up, recover, attack their rivals, sprint for points or Cash (which is the best). The spectators witnessed some edge of the seat excitement on the final night of Six Day racing at the FCV.

The Program that has been designed with the spectator in mind provides a variety of races and allows the Cycling fan an opportunity to get involved with the action as it happens 20 feet away. Night 6 provided the thrill and a spill that separates the men from the boys. In the end two teams won their respective divisions, however, it was the enthusiasm of all the riders to put on a clean, safe and exciting show for every spectator to enjoy. The FCV thanks all the riders who participated in our Autumn Six Day Bike race, to all the Officials and runners that kept the riders ready to perform, and most importantly the spectators who so generously put up the "primes" to put the prize pool over $4,250.00, which was distributed to the riders at the "after party" which has become a custom at the FCV.

How the evening unfolded:

The last night of racing saw the most laps gained or lost depending on which side of the lap you were on. In the "B" division, the race was between 3 teams entering the first Madison, the Red team had a lead that was attacked early by the Black and Purple teams. The initial attack put the Red team on their heels until the Black team missed their first exchange, while the pace was full on the Red and Purple team's capitalized and went up a lap each on the field. Minutes later another attack by the Purple team of Kyle Rupay and Joe Brennan (New Jersey) caused havoc in the pack with everyone scrambling to make clean exchanges and bring back the leaders, after what seemed like an hour, (really only 4 minutes) the Purple Boys capitalized on mistakes by the other teams and found themselves in second behind the Red Team of Stephanie Bester and Ryan Aitchenson (who would ultimately win the bike race by 2 laps).

It was nice to see the Twins (Sarah and Emily) continuing to gain experience and confidence over the six days of racing. The Black team would end up third in the overall standings with Team Green and Blue rounding out the top 5 during the competition.

Now let's look at the Elite division, where all the fireworks took place during the three hours of racing. The local favorites Team Delhi attacked early in the first Madison and slipped away without any response from the other teams. This would come back to haunt a couple of the higher placed teams by the end of the night. With an early lap in the pocket, Delhi was content to sit waiting for the primes to come up. As the teams watched one another a $100 "prime" meant that the pace was about to go through the roof..... It did, the Can-Am team of Crosby and Abbey followed the powerhouse Team Ontario through the line for second then launched what turned out to be the move of the night, they attacked over Ontario and really put Quebec (Raymond & Rooseboom) in a world of hurt. As the Jam continued the distance stayed the same at 1/3 of a lap between the 2 teams. 5 laps went by with very little change, then a huge effort by Crosby sent the margin to 3/4 of a lap and within a lap the Can-Am team solidified their hold on 2nd position overall, which they would not relinquish.

All this action happened in the first 10 minutes of a 30 minute chase, tongues were dragging and the oxygen seemed to be sucked from the building, with all the very hard racing going on.... The crowd loved it and offered up even more "primes" in the final 20 minutes.

Prime sprints make the race and the riders did not disappoint with excellent three-wide racing for every prime sprint on offer. The best sprint to the line was the $50 prime with 2 minutes left in the first chase. Abbey led out with six laps to go. In the pack Team London jumped to try to close the 30m gap.... Brandon Throop who has had a solid race with partner Scott (don't call me Jeff) Lundy, came over three teams to challenge Abbey in the final lap. With 30m to close and only 138m to do it, Throop dug deep to not only close the gap but surprise Abbey at the line by pipping the Can-Am team for the Cash.

In the final 45 min Madison of the afternoon, the teams were content to contest the primes but let the race unfold as the other nights with a hard tempo being set by the ultimate winners of the FCV Six Day, Team Ontario of "DD and Vince DeJong". A few half hearted attempts to split the field failed during the chase. That is until less than 5 minutes remaining in the race. That's when Mike Renneboog and Dave Byer of Team Delhi took the entire field by surprise and proceeded to gain 1/2 a lap while everyone else was waiting for someone else to bring it back, finally Team Quebec realized that if Delhi took the lap they would fall to fourth position after battling for second the entire six nights. Delhi was within 40m of catching the field when Brian Crosby's tire de-laminated and crashed (no injuries.... hardly a scrap). We have a rule that when there is a crash the field is neutralized until we get aid to the fallen rider. This put a stop to a very entertaining attack by Team Delhi. The final sprint on the night was again a crowd pleaser as three riders battled for the final double points on offer with Team Quebec coming home with the victory.

Over all a very good bike race - the riders went home with a pocket full of cash, the Cadets and Juniors in the "B" division learned a ton about race tactics and how to race. This is the development that the FCV has been doing for the past 3 1/2 years and will continue to do with all of our up and coming racers.